1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a diagnosis and interpretation method for a personal nutrition program. More particularly, the present invention relates to an interactive, dynamic, Internet-based human-machine system with specialized problem-solving expertise that aids an individual consumer in developing a personal nutrition program tailored to the individual consumer""s health needs and permits the consumer to produce individual products for ingestion.
2. Background Information
Being healthy means much more than getting treatment for an illness. Health-conscious individual consumers want to have more energy, be stronger, stay mentally alert, and feel healthier and happier; however, each of us is unique. No two bodies or lifestyles are identical. Some of us eat a well-balanced diet whereas others simply diet. One person""s metabolism differs from another""s. Our habits and programs differentiate us. Our genetic codes are individual. Where we live, what we do, the foods we eat, the air we breathe and the water we drink all combine to make each of us unique.
Studies prove that individual consumer diets do not contain the optimal levels of nutrition needed to prevent disease and attain peak health. For example, a 1978 study on consumption conducted by the National Food Council showed that not one person out of 21,500 surveyed received the entire Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) of vitamins and minerals through diet alone. And, more than 80% of the men and 70% of the women received less than two-thirds of the RDA nutrients from their diets. Thus, consumers often need to supplement their diet in order to get the most out of life.
Many consumers have taken charge of their own health and wellbeing by taking daily nutritional supplements. To understand what products will benefit them and how to address their specific health issues, many consumers have turned to the Internet. The Internet is an international network of interconnected computers that enables millions of people to communicate with one another in xe2x80x9ccyberspacexe2x80x9d and to access vast amounts of information from around the world. This network of networks uses certain standard procedures for regulating data transmission between computers such as Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) or HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) for HyperText Markup Language (HTML) documents. The physical connections of the Internet and the protocols and communication procedures of the Internet are well-known to those in the art.
Through the Internet, individuals may seek out health and nutrition information to educate themselves about a healthier personal lifestyle and use this detailed information to make informed purchase decisions. However, even with the availability of this information through the Internet, it is very difficult for individual consumers to navigate through the myriad of health studies and decide what they should and should not consume. Furthermore, many consumers dismiss such important health information and resort to consuming eight, twelve, or even eighteen pills a day just to ensure that they are receiving sufficient amounts of vitamins, minerals, and anti-oxidants from generalized formula supplements made for the average person. Unfortunately, taking these generalized formula supplements made for the average person means ingesting binders, excessive fillers, and lubricants, as well as micronutrients in each menu of pills. Moreover, these various pills are often difficult to locate for purchase, are hard to swallow and may contain some vitamins or minerals that are not needed or may not have enough of what is needed. In turn, this leads many individuals to give up on their personal supplement program before the two or three months it takes for such programs to realize their full health potential.
Alternatively, individual consumers may obtain personalized nutritional supplements by seeking out expert nutritionists or pharmacists"" services. FIG. 1 shows the various operations required in the prior art to distribute personalized supplements to an individual consumer. As shown in FIG. 1, the consumer first answers a series of health questions, as operation 12, on a form received from a nutrition consultant. The consumer then gives the answers to the nutritionist at operation 14. Upon receiving these answers, the nutritionist formulates a supplement program based on the consumer""s answers by using public knowledge in operation 16 such as that found in published books. The nutritionist then tailors this formulation specifically to the individual consumer by using known, personal knowledge at operation 18 such as rules of thumb or heuristics. Heuristics enable the human expert to make educated guesses when necessary, to recognize promising approaches to problems and to deal effectively with erroneous or incomplete data. From operation 18, the nutritionist creates the supplement from raw powders in operation 20 and distributes the supplements to the consumer in operation 22.
The benefit of this process is that the consumer obtains a supplement that is personalized and free of extraneous material. However, this process is expensive for the consumer, is limited to geographic areas in which expert nutritionists reside, and requires the consumer to always consult the expert since the consumer lacks access to the expert""s personal knowledge 18. The Internet is one area that provides a vehicle to address these problems.
As a unique and wholly new medium of worldwide human communication, the Internet is changing every area of humanity, primarily through the use of host computers. Host computers are those that store information and relay communications. Individuals can obtain access to the Internet from many different sources, generally hosts themselves or entities with a host affiliation. Many corporations provide their employees with access through an office network; most colleges and universities provide access for their students and faculty; many communities and local libraries provide free access; and an increasing number of storefront xe2x80x9ccomputer coffee shopsxe2x80x9d provide access for a small hourly fee. Several major national xe2x80x9conline servicesxe2x80x9d such as America Online, CompuServe, the Microsoft Network and Prodigy offer access to their own extensive proprietary networks, as well as a link to the much larger resources of the Internet.
Anyone with access to the Internet may take advantage of a wide variety of communication and information retrieval methods. These methods are constantly evolving. Methods such as electronic mail (xe2x80x9ce mailxe2x80x9d), automatic mailing list services (xe2x80x9cmail exploders,xe2x80x9d sometimes referred to as xe2x80x9clistservsxe2x80x9d), xe2x80x9cnewsgroups,xe2x80x9d xe2x80x9cchat rooms,xe2x80x9d and the xe2x80x9cWorld Wide Webxe2x80x9d can be used to transmit text; most can transmit sound, pictures, and moving video images. Taken together, these tools constitute a unique mediumxe2x80x94known to its users as xe2x80x9ccyberspacexe2x80x9dxe2x80x94located in no particular geographical location but available to anyone, anywhere in the world, with access to the Internet.
The best known category of communication over the Internet is the World Wide Web, which allows users to search for and retrieve information stored in remote computers, as well as, in some cases, to communicate back to designated sites. In concrete terms, the Web consists of a vast number of documents stored in different computers all over the world. Some of these documents are simply files containing information; however, more elaborate documents, commonly known as Web pages, are also prevalent. Each has its own addressxe2x80x94rather like a telephone number. Web pages frequently contain information and sometimes allow the viewer to communicate with the page""s (or xe2x80x9csite""sxe2x80x9d) author. They generally also contain xe2x80x9clinksxe2x80x9d to other documents created by that site""s author or to other (generally) related sites. Typically, the links are either blue or underlined textxe2x80x94sometimes images.
Navigating the Web is relatively straightforward. A user may either type the address of a known page or enter one or more keywords into a commercial xe2x80x9csearch enginexe2x80x9d in an effort to locate sites on a subject of interest. A particular Web page may contain the information sought by the xe2x80x9csurferxe2x80x9d or, through its links, it may be an avenue to other documents located anywhere on the Internet. Users generally explore a given Web page, or move to another, by clicking a computer xe2x80x9cmousexe2x80x9d on one of the page""s icons or links. Some xe2x80x9cWeb sitesxe2x80x9d provide information whereas other Web sites offer goods or services for purchase by credit card through online communication. Access to most Web pages is freely available, but some allow access only to those who have purchased the right from a commercial provider. The Web is thus comparable, from the user""s viewpoint, to both a vast library including millions of readily available and indexed publications and a sprawling mall offering goods and services.
As noted, the power of the Internet goes far beyond delivering consumer information. From the sales of goods and services point of view, the Web constitutes a vast platform from which to market and sell to a worldwide audience of millions of buyers. Internet users may purchase goods or services, register their opinion on a variety of topics through online surveys, or manipulate game pieces in playing games against opponents thousands of miles away. All of these interactive actions may be performed from the comfort of the user""s own home.
Taking advantage of the Internet, a fixed-form Excel spreadsheet Web page into which xe2x80x9cYes/Noxe2x80x9d answers are placed by consumers has been used in the eventual development of consumer supplement formulas. (Excel is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash.) The consumer""s answers are propagated through Excel spreadsheet cell formulas to yield a supplement formula. A nutritionist receives and reviews the supplement formula, alters the supplement formula, and sends it back to the consumer. After the consumer agrees to the formula, the nutritionist manufactures the supplement pills from raw powder.
This static structure system, although functional, is extremely difficult to maintain. For example, any changes to the makeup of the supplement formulas would require rewriting a significant portion of the spreadsheet and adding new formulas and questions to the system. Compounding this situation, the Web interface to this system makes use of the static Excel spreadsheet itself, launching a copy of Excel every time a formula is to be computed, and placing questionnaire answers into specific cells in the spreadsheet. Such an interface is both awkward and extremely inefficient. Moreover, the data used to support this system is not relational, does not permit for interactive modifications, and does not respond in real time.
Thus, even with the availability of these Internet-based, interactive actions, no Internet-based expert system exists that permits an individual to develop a personal nutrition program tailored to the individual consumer""s needs, such that the resulting supplement formula is transmitted by the user directly to a manufacturing plant for the manufacture of the supplement product for shipment to the user.
What is needed is a human-machine system with specialized problem-solving expertise that permits individuals to personalize their choice of products for purchase through the Internet, where that system is linked directly to the product""s manufacturing devices so that the process of selecting, altering, ordering, manufacturing, packaging and delivering the final product is streamlined and largely in the hands of the individual consumer.
What is also needed is a human-machine system with specialized problem-solving expertise that permits individuals to take charge of their personal health and nutrition through the Internet by assisting supplement consumers in developing personal nutrition programs designed specifically for their needs. The system should be dynamic enough to incorporate public and known information based on the latest knowledge that underlies human expertise with personal nutrition and nutrition products. Based on this expert information, the system should allow the consumer to obtain a specific program of recommended levels of the vitamins and minerals through easy-to-use, diagnostic questions. To benefit knowledgeable and experienced users of nutritional supplements, the system should further permit such users to personalize their nutrition program by adjusting the recommended levels of the nutrients in their program or by adding additional anti-oxidants or nutrients that work based on observational data of these nutrients. Through its interactive process and ability to dynamically change over time, the system should allow consumers to obtain a complete and balanced, high quality nutritional supplement program that cost effectively reduces the number of capsules a consumer needs to take, so as to increase purchasing convenience and program compliance.
The present invention relates to a method for developing an ingestible formula through a network that operates according to a hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP). A plurality of first statements inviting a plurality of first responses are received at a client computer system. The associated first responses are then received at the client computer system. A server computer system coupled over the network to the client computer system then receives the first responses. The server computer system processes the first responses according to a relational database to produce the ingestible formula. Various embodiments and features are disclosed.